Version 4 of the software...

[Tootsie]

Is now available in beta.
Silhouette states clearly that it is not supported and is only for those who wish to test, however it does mean we are a step closer to having it....

[DJG]

Is now available in beta.
Silhouette states clearly that it is not supported and is only for those who wish to test, however it does mean we are a step closer to having it....

Thanks Diane but I wont bother with the beta version. I know a lot of people have been waiting for this maybe thinking it will solve any/all problems but I'm not so sure because each version has it's own problem.....I do hope it solves the bluetooth and autoblade problems so many have been having with the Cameo 3
EDITED
Lisa AKA Craftfairy has ok'd me copying this from a Facebook group we both belong to..........
We have posted the Silhouette Studio® V4 Open Beta version (V4.0.438). This is available to the public at the following link:
https://www.silhouetteamerica.com/so...egacy-software
(listed under the “Beta & Legacy Versions” section)
New major differences from V3 to V4 are as follows:
· New updated look – Modernized software look and feel.
· Updated Mode navigation – The Design, Store, Library, and Send navigation is now conveniently located in the software’s upper right-hand side. This allows users to quickly and easily toggle between viewing their design workspace versus shopping, navigating through their library, or sending jobs to the Silhouette.
· Send to Silhouette revamp – The method of sending jobs to the Silhouette now walks users easily and intuitively through the process of preparing their job to be sent to a Silhouette machine. This includes friendly steps that have you select your material type and then define your job settings, as well as images walking newer users on making sure they’ve loaded their material or mat properly and set up the blade or other tool into the Silhouette as needed.
· Floating panels – Users can open and move around multiple panels for increased control.
· Dynamic Toolbar – A new dynamic toolbar located along the top of the program will provide shortcuts to quickly adjust selected object properties depending on what is being selected (i.e. quickly adjust fill color, line color, or even font style if text is being selected).
· New project start-up options – When starting a new document, users are given project type options (i.e. blank document, card, Print & Cut, PixScan, etc). Depending on the type of document selected, the program will automatically open appropriate panels to help get the user started with the specific job type more easily.
· Improved Tracing features – In addition to the previous tracing options, V4 offers a “Trace by Color” and “Magnet Trace” option (DE version and above only).
· Tutorials feature – A new “Tutorials” tool is now found under the “Help” menu. This walks users through how to use various tools. In this initial launch of the Open Beta, there are only a couple to show the concept, but we will be building these out so that upon release there is a broader library of tutorials to help new and existing users to better understand how to use the software.
At start-up, users will be shown a brief slide-show giving them an overview of some of the new features to help with the transition to V4 (most of the above points). There is a V4 Beta Guide (found in the “Help” menu) giving an overview of some of the major changes introduced in V4.
A few notes about the V4 Beta:
· You are only able to run one instance of Silhouette Studio®. If you opt to run V4, it will overwrite any public release version you have installed. In other words, you cannot run V3.8 and V4 at the same time.
· In order to run the Beta version, users will be prompted to agree to allow Silhouette the ability to collect performance information automatically about how the program is running (non-identifying data).
· As a Beta version, this version is not supported. Feedback and bug reports can be provided at https://www.silhouetteamerica.com/beta-feedback. This is a feedback form. No response will be provided.
· Your library and license keys will transfer from older versions to V4. You should not need to have to re-download your library or re-apply your license key.

[BrianP]

I do hope it solves the bluetooth and autoblade problems so many have been having with the Cameo 3

I'm a little out of the loop at the moment so could you please tell me which bluetooth problems you're referring to? As far as I am aware pretty much all bluetooth issues should be resolved with the v1.40 firmware.

[DJG]

I'm a little out of the loop at the moment so could you please tell me which bluetooth problems you're referring to? As far as I am aware pretty much all bluetooth issues should be resolved with the v1.40 firmware.

Brian I'm still using the original Cameo so haven't got bluetooth with my machine but I belong to several Silhouette Facebook groups and various people are mentioning their "bluetooth doesn't work" no reason given other than that. Also some members on here had problems with bluetooth which may have been fixed with the latest stable version of Studio or the updated firmware. If anyone here still as a bluetooth problem could you please add to this post

[BrianP]

Brian I'm still using the original Cameo so haven't got bluetooth with my machine but I belong to several Silhouette Facebook groups and various people are mentioning their "bluetooth doesn't work" no reason given other than that. Also some members on here had problems with bluetooth which may have been fixed with the latest stable version of Studio or the updated firmware. If anyone here still as a bluetooth problem could you please add to this post

Thanks for the info. I would certainly agree that bluetooth doesn't work with firmware 1.10 to 1.30 but from my experience 1.40 fixed these problems. So if anyone does still have bluetooth problems they should updated to v1.40 firmware and then test it again, after which I would be interested to know if they still have problems.

[AndiDee]

Can I ask if it will be possible to upgrade direct to version 4 without having had to go with all the cloud updates that came after version 3.6.57? I still have the Cam2 (plus a Curio) and I thought long and hard about the Cam3 but didn't need bluetooth or the dual carriage, so decided it wasn't for me; with all the problems that people were reporting with regard to the updates/Cloud etc I have not gone for any of the later updates either and still work with the excellent 3.6.57. However, the new features mentioned in post #2 (thanks Doreen) could be useful to me, and I have DE, so I may wait until the beta version has thrown up (and resolved) the major bugs and then take it - it isn't good to get too far behind the technology - I think my only problem is "users will be prompted to agree to allow Silhouette the ability to collect performance information automatically" regardless of their assurance that it will be non-identifying, I never agree to allow ANYONE too much access to my computer info, and the thought of Studio "phoning home" is something I'm really not happy about. If it is an optional opt-in/out function, not one imposed as a condition of upgrading, then okay, but if not then I would consider that Silhouette have taken my money to have the DE version under false pretenses by not allowing me choice, and I'll seek an alternative software.

Andi

[DJG]

Can I ask if it will be possible to upgrade direct to version 4 without having had to go with all the cloud updates that came after version 3.6.57? I still have the Cam2 (plus a Curio) and I thought long and hard about the Cam3 but didn't need bluetooth or the dual carriage, so decided it wasn't for me; with all the problems that people were reporting with regard to the updates/Cloud etc I have not gone for any of the later updates either and still work with the excellent 3.6.57. However, the new features mentioned in post #2 (thanks Doreen) could be useful to me, and I have DE, so I may wait until the beta version has thrown up (and resolved) the major bugs and then take it - it isn't good to get too far behind the technology - I think my only problem is "users will be prompted to agree to allow Silhouette the ability to collect performance information automatically" regardless of their assurance that it will be non-identifying, I never agree to allow ANYONE too much access to my computer info, and the thought of Studio "phoning home" is something I'm really not happy about. If it is an optional opt-in/out function, not one imposed as a condition of upgrading, then okay, but if not then I would consider that Silhouette have taken my money to have the DE version under false pretenses by not allowing me choice, and I'll seek an alternative software.

Andi

Hopefully Brian will know the answer Andie. It might only be for the Beta version so they can see how it goes. I wont be downloading it until it's stable

[Neries]

Doreen I am not going to download it straight away either. I will wait until they release it as the latest download.

I have not tried the Bluetooth on my Cameo 3 since the firmware update of V1.40. Waiting until my auto blade problem is sorted before trying that out.

[DJG]

Doreen I am not going to download it straight away either. I will wait until they release it as the latest download.

I have not tried the Bluetooth on my Cameo 3 since the firmware update of V1.40. Waiting until my auto blade problem is sorted before trying that out.

I don't blame you Margaret

[Sandi_Kent]

I bit the bullet and updated to v4 an so far I am very happy. I am in the process of cutting wedding invitations at the moment for my friend and they are cutting cleanly and it seems quicker? I can also confirm no problems at all with my bluetooth since firmware updated to 1.4. I did give up on the auto blade early on as it was hopeless but I am going to put it back in and give it another go.
Have also played with the trace function and there was one particular item I have been trying to trace on an off for a while with the new colour choice to trace by it did it first time how happy was I.

I am also running on windows 10 just in case anyone was wondering.

Will be testing out the other features over the next couple of days, if only I had more hours! I absolutely love my 3 now. At first it was a defo love hate relationship but now its all love! :-)

[DJG]

I bit the bullet and updated to v4 an so far I am very happy. I am in the process of cutting wedding invitations at the moment for my friend and they are cutting cleanly and it seems quicker? I can also confirm no problems at all with my bluetooth since firmware updated to 1.4. I did give up on the auto blade early on as it was hopeless but I am going to put it back in and give it another go.
Have also played with the trace function and there was one particular item I have been trying to trace on an off for a while with the new colour choice to trace by it did it first time how happy was I.

I am also running on windows 10 just in case anyone was wondering.

Will be testing out the other features over the next couple of days, if only I had more hours! I absolutely love my 3 now. At first it was a defo love hate relationship but now its all love! :-)

Thanks for the feedback Sandi glad you're happy with it

[Neries]

I bit the bullet and updated to v4 an so far I am very happy. I am in the process of cutting wedding invitations at the moment for my friend and they are cutting cleanly and it seems quicker? I can also confirm no problems at all with my bluetooth since firmware updated to 1.4. I did give up on the auto blade early on as it was hopeless but I am going to put it back in and give it another go.
Have also played with the trace function and there was one particular item I have been trying to trace on an off for a while with the new colour choice to trace by it did it first time how happy was I.

I am also running on windows 10 just in case anyone was wondering.

Will be testing out the other features over the next couple of days, if only I had more hours! I absolutely love my 3 now. At first it was a defo love hate relationship but now its all love! :-)

Sandi your positive comments make me tempted to download the new beta v4.

What were your problems with the auto blade? I am just wondering if there are more owners out there who have given up on the auto blade like you.

[Jampot]

I like the sound of the new version but won't be downloading it until any teething problems are sorted first.

[BrianP]

Can I ask if it will be possible to upgrade direct to version 4 without having had to go with all the cloud updates that came after version 3.6.57? I still have the Cam2 (plus a Curio) and I thought long and hard about the Cam3 but didn't need bluetooth or the dual carriage, so decided it wasn't for me; with all the problems that people were reporting with regard to the updates/Cloud etc I have not gone for any of the later updates either and still work with the excellent 3.6.57. However, the new features mentioned in post #2 (thanks Doreen) could be useful to me, and I have DE, so I may wait until the beta version has thrown up (and resolved) the major bugs and then take it - it isn't good to get too far behind the technology - I think my only problem is "users will be prompted to agree to allow Silhouette the ability to collect performance information automatically" regardless of their assurance that it will be non-identifying, I never agree to allow ANYONE too much access to my computer info, and the thought of Studio "phoning home" is something I'm really not happy about. If it is an optional opt-in/out function, not one imposed as a condition of upgrading, then okay, but if not then I would consider that Silhouette have taken my money to have the DE version under false pretenses by not allowing me choice, and I'll seek an alternative software.

Andi

Yes, you can update from v3.6 to v4.0.

As for the gathering of info, it is very common in beta software for this type of info gathering to be done as it is needed for the developers to detect crashes and fix them before final release.

The info gathered is just the following:

Timing related data - i.e. info measuring the responsiveness of Silhouette studio and certain features & functions.
Crash related data - i.e. reports of crashes and what you were doing when the software crashed.
Usage data - i.e. features being used/not used, and the crash related usage mentioned above.

The software does not gathered any personal info or any info not related to Silhouette Studio.

I am a very security conscious person when it comes to PC and software usage and in my opinion this is perfectly normal stuff for beta software to be collecting. We (the users) want this type of stuff collected during beta development because it helps fix problems before the software is released and used by the general public. If you feel you do not want to be part of this data collection then simply ignore the beta version and wait for the full release as this will not require the gathering of usage data.

I've tried the beta and I like it, I've not had any crashes or problems whilst using it it, even though it is beta and it looks like it could be really good once finished.

[DJG]

Yes, you can update from v3.6 to v4.0.

As for the gathering of info, it is very common in beta software for this type of info gathering to be done as it is needed for the developers to detect crashes and fix them before final release.

The info gathered is just the following:

Timing related data - i.e. info measuring the responsiveness of Silhouette studio and certain features & functions.
Crash related data - i.e. reports of crashes and what you were doing when the software crashed.
Usage data - i.e. features being used/not used, and the crash related usage mentioned above.

The software does not gathered any personal info or any info not related to Silhouette Studio.

I am a very security conscious person when it comes to PC and software usage and in my opinion this is perfectly normal stuff for beta software to be collecting. We (the users) want this type of stuff collected during beta development because it helps fix problems before the software is released and used by the general public. If you feel you do not want to be part of this data collection then simply ignore the beta version and wait for the full release as this will not require the gathering of usage data.

I've tried the beta and I like it, I've not had any crashes or problems whilst using it it, even though it is beta and it looks like it could be really good once finished.

Thank you Brian I must admit I'm very tempted to try it